Archive | January 18, 2011

As the new year gets underway and winter CHA products are revealed, there is an obvious trend that continues to grow and flourish: Rosettes. Whether made from crepe paper, ribbon, or patterned paper, they are a hot item to purchase and make. Something I like about them is that they can be used as a circle embellishment, as a center to a larger embellishment, or as a flower. They don’t have the super feminine look that flowers so often do, and the colors and designs can vary from a bright and graphic look, to a more vintage and soft look. In other words – rosettes can be made to suit most any style!

Rosettes are created from strips that are either folded, crumpled, or otherwise pleated into a circle. It’s simple enough to make your own, though I tend to find the process time consuming unless you’re going for a more rustic crumpled look. Here is a link to a great vintage rosette tutorial video by Lain Ehmann.

To make your own folded paper rosette, you’ll simply need to fan fold a strip of paper. I find this tends to be tedious. I never can keep the folds the same size (without considerable amount of effort and time), and the look is never just right when I’m done. When I want to make this style of rosette, I reach instead for my Tim Holtz Alterations rosette die.

If you like the convenience of the die too, you’ll be happy to hear that Tim recently showed a sneak peek on his blog of a new (smaller) rosette die coming soon. So there will be more size options available for those choosing this method of making rosettes.

The Girls’ Paperie has some cool crepe paper layered rosettes available, and I’ve heard that in 2011 the Girls’ Paperie will be one to watch for more vintage inspired rosettes. In fact – as a design team member – I’ve been able to work with some new designs already, and I believe they’re going to be a hit!

In researching for this article, I also found these new K & Co. ribbon rosettes. So lovely! I am excited to see not only new products featuring rosettes, but also more tutorials and project examples with handmade ones popping up on my favorite blogs.

I have been wishing rosette ribbons would start to pop up, and Jenni Bowlin just released this sneak peek of ribbons coming soon. So fantastic! They will be available in several colors, and are already at the top of my wish list.

To show how I put rosettes in action for my own personal style, I created a layout featuring a few of my favorite photos from my girls’ recent meeting with Santa to share today:

From childhood pages filled with whimsy to vintage inspired pages, and for every color out there, there’s likely a way to make a rosette work. I’m sure that the rosette trend is here to stay for a while. It goes so well with many other existing trends (such as banners, vintage, etc) and the materials and options are nearly endless – I’m glad to play with them more this year.

Do you like this product trend? What is your favorite way to put rosettes to use? Please feel free to share with us in the comments!

[Disclosure: May Flaum does design work for The Girls Paperie and Tim Holtz.]